


Cyanide

by thefoxinthesweater



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bucky's point of view, Goodbyes, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Stucky - Freeform, Suicide Attempt, Suicide Notes, note
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-21
Updated: 2014-08-21
Packaged: 2018-02-14 02:02:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2173854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefoxinthesweater/pseuds/thefoxinthesweater
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"And even though I don’t remember protecting you when we were younger, I want to honor the Bucky you knew. I want to do what he would have done. And I think he would do the same thing I’m doing. I know you won’t agree, but I’m protecting you, Steve. I’m a weapon, and as long as I live, HYDRA is going to think of me as a weapon they can use to get to you. I refuse to be used that way."</p>
<p>Bucky's memories don't come back post-Winter Soldier, but he learns enough about James Buchanan Barnes to know that he would have died to protect Steve Rogers. So that's what he does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cyanide

**Author's Note:**

  * For [allyoop](https://archiveofourown.org/users/allyoop/gifts).



> Please do heed the warnings. This is a fic in the form of Bucky's suicide note. If that's not your cup of tea, read some cute fluff instead (and send me recs!). This is intended to be a one-shot, although I may write a sequel detailing Steve's reaction if this one is well-recieved. And, as always, thanks for reading :)

Steve—

You’ll never know what it’s like to wake up with a sick emptiness in your gut and no knowledge of who you are, to wake up to people treating you like a weapon, like a toy. At least, I hope you’ll never have to experience that. I felt so empty, and I still do. The memories I want are nowhere to be found, yet the memories that haunt me are all too accessible. I’m still afraid to fall asleep at night because I think I’ll wake up and I won’t remember anything. I won’t remember you. You deserve to be remembered, Steve. Just writing your name makes me smile, makes me feel like I have a chance at being whole again. I don’t remember anything from before, from back when we were kids, but I’ve seen pictures, and I’ve seen films. I’ve read the stories. I’ve experienced your kindness, your compassion, your friendship even now, when I know I don’t deserve them. Steve, you’re more than I could ever be, and you always have been. Steven Grant Rogers. It was your name that saved me. I never told you that. There’s a lot I didn’t tell you. A lot I couldn’t tell you. It’s impossible to even begin to explain some of these things, Steve. And you’re so good—just so fucking good—that I couldn’t do that to you. You’re the purest thing left in this country, and you’re real. So beautifully and painfully real. And I couldn’t tell you, because telling you would have ruined you. I know that Bucky used to protect you, and I wanted to keep up the illusion that I was the man you once knew. Just one more time, I wanted to protect you.

After the helicarrier crashed, I pulled your body out of the water. I don’t know why I did it. I don’t know why I didn’t kill you. I was a weapon—I am a weapon—and weapons don’t make their own decisions. But somewhere, beneath everything HYDRA had done, a piece of me recognized you. Every morning, I wake up in your apartment, thankful to have even that small part that recognizes you. It’s better than nothing. Sometimes, there’s just enough Bucky Barnes inside me to realize just how much I’m missing. I didn’t know if you were still breathing after I pulled you ashore, and I didn’t check. I looked at you and I could feel HYDRA’s work slowly coming undone. I was coming undone. So I walked away. When they had briefed me on the mission, they said my target was “Steve Rogers, alias: Captain America.” But as I walked away from the HYDRA’s burning empire, there was something else stuck in my head: Steven Grant Rogers. The name was on repeat in my mind. Every fucking second of the day, I was thinking “Steven Grant Rogers.” Sometimes I even caught myself whispering the name under my breath. It came so easily. I knew it had to be you: my mission. My friend? I could hardly sleep, but when I did manage to close my eyes, I dreamt about you, and the first thought I had upon waking was “Steven Grant Rogers.” I couldn’t understand why I knew the whole name, though. HYDRA had—to the best of my knowledge—never told me. And even if they had, they were nothing if not thorough when wiping my memory. I found the files. I know what they did to me, to Bucky. If I couldn’t remember my own name, how the fuck could I have remembered yours? But I did. And after the mess with the helicarriers, I found some regular clothes. I kept a couple of knives and a gun, but dropped most of the weapons. I walked the streets of D.C. for days, unnoticed, even though I’m sure there were remaining HYDRA agents out looking for me. But they would have expected me to run, to go to one of their safe houses. They never would have thought that I would stay in D.C. One night, there was this kid—probably thirteen or so, even though he looked younger—getting beat up in an alley. He was short, scrawny, pale. Not the kind of kid you see in fights. Except I had seen a kid like that in fights before. I wanted to keep walking, but I just couldn’t look away. Finally, I pulled the big son of a bitch off the poor guy, and he ran off pretty damn quickly when he got a good look at me. Didn’t want my metal fingers around his neck, probably. But the little guy just looked up at me—didn’t smile, didn’t say thanks, didn’t ask questions. He looked almost angry that I had interfered, and I thought he was going to say something, at least, but he never did. Eventually, he just stood up and walked away. For a moment, it felt like I was in Brooklyn. It’s obvious now, but I didn’t know why at the time. So I stole a car and drove there. Just drove to Brooklyn. I shouldn’t have told you that I stole the car, but I did. And it seemed like it just drove itself to this neighborhood with old, run-down buildings. I didn’t know where I was, but I felt calm there. I saw a plaque on one of the buildings. It said that it was the old home of Steven Grant Rogers, the man who became Captain America, and his best friend, James Buchanan Barnes. I remembered that. You called me that name on the helicarrier. You called me that, and you called me Bucky. And as I stood in front of that building, I believed you. The plaque said that some of your old belongings were at the Smithsonian, so I decided to go back to D.C. to find them. But I stayed the night in the empty apartment. Let myself in and fell asleep in the middle of the living room floor. No one has lived there for a long, long time, Steve. There were cobwebs and mold everywhere, but it was the best sleep I’ve ever had. In the morning, as I left, I saw old people sitting by their windows, shouting at their neighbors or yelling at each other. I finally felt like HYDRA wasn’t chasing me anymore. There were kids in the street kicking a ball around, watching me out of the corners of their eyes as I walked away. Their parents and grandparents were watching me, too, but none of them knew who I was, and it almost felt like home. I drove back to D.C. and went to the Smithsonian, and I read everything there. I looked at pictures, I saw the film footage. I saw you, and you looked like some Greek god, hell-bent on saving the world. But next to you, I always saw a face that looked so familiar and yet so foreign. I knew it was me. That’s the only time I’ve been thankful for the training HYDRA put me through. I cracked, but only on the inside. Sometimes I wonder how it’s possible to feel pain when I’m already dead in every way but one. I saw what we were, saw what I was. They said I died “in the service of my country.” I wish I had died in the service of my country. I wish I had died protecting you. But HYDRA took that away from me. Bucky Barnes died a hero, but I was made into a villain. They took away everything I knew and made me into a monster. I wish they had killed me. But no. They kept me alive just enough to kill me again. And again. I don’t know how many times they wiped my memory, Stevie. I don’t know how many times I woke up and murmured your name and was wiped again because of it. I don’t remember most of what I’ve done, but my muscles do. Muscle memory is an awful thing. It tells me how to take a life from hundreds of meters away, how to wield a knife most effectively up close, how to snap a neck to paralyze, and worst of all, how to sit in the chair like HYDRA’s good little pet and wait for whatever they’ll give me. Sometimes I wonder why my muscles don’t remember you. I wish they would. I know the pictures don’t show it, but sometimes I feel like my muscles should remember you. And then I wonder if your muscles remember me. I couldn’t ask you about it, Steve, even if I had been able to talk to you. But one week in your apartment and only five words out of me, the rest nothing but sidelong glances and cautious movements. I’m so sorry, Steve. I have some of the words now, the words I meant to say, wanted to say, but couldn’t. But writing them down is just as hard as trying to say them. I’ve written this up and thrown the damned thing away too many times to count.

Steve, I need to thank you for letting me stay with you this past week. You said I could stay indefinitely, and you said I could call it my home. You told me you would protect me from HYDRA, and you vowed to help me readjust to my new life. That means so much to me, and I’m so sorry I couldn’t express my gratitude earlier. You didn’t push anything on me. You didn’t try to get me to remember. You didn’t ask questions when I showed up in your apartment that night, dirty and hungry and afraid. I’m not dirty or hungry anymore, Stevie, but I’m still afraid. I’m sure I sounded like an idiot when I said, “I thought you were smaller,” when you walked in the door, and I wish I could have drawn the expression of relief and happiness on your face when you entered the room. But between the two of us, you’re the artist, so I’ll have to rely on my memory for that. It feels weird, having to rely on my memory for something when it’s been gone for so long. It’s like having a car sit in a garage for seventy years and hoping it starts after all that time. But if there’s one thing I want in my memory, it’s you. It has always been you. You’re everything I’ve ever had, and you’re all I will ever have. Steve, as long as HYDRA is looking for me, you’ll never be safe. And even though I don’t remember protecting you when we were younger, I want to honor the Bucky you knew. I want to do what he would have done. And I think he would do the same thing I’m doing. I know you won’t agree, but I’m protecting you, Steve. I’m a weapon, and as long as I live, HYDRA is going to think of me as a weapon they can use to get to you. I refuse to be used that way. But I know you. I don’t remember a damn thing about me, yet I know you. You would do incredibly stupid things to save Bucky, and he would have done the exact same for you. But Bucky Barnes died in 1945, Steve. The person you’re trying to save—I’m not him. I’ve read a lot about him and I know that I can never be the man he was. I can never be the partner he was to you. I’m nothing more than the empty shell of a dead soldier who was lost in the war. But I’m going to do what he would have done. I’m going to do one last thing to protect him—and you. Maybe it will make up for everything I’ve done under HYDRA’s command, but I doubt it. So many lives, Steve. Do you even know how many I’ve taken? I’ll be damned if I let your name be added to the Winter Soldier’s résumé. Your life is too beautiful to be cut short. And even though I’ve seen how my life could be with you, I know that I can’t live in this world, not with the knowledge that my presence puts you in danger. I don’t want to wake you up in the middle of the night with my screams from when the wrong memories flood my mind. I don’t want you to feel like you have to be cautious around me because I’m a grenade that hasn’t exploded yet, but I am. The pin is just waiting to fall out. And hey, you can’t sleep on your couch forever while I hog the bed, right Stevie?

I’ve been watching you through the window as you’re reading this, Steve. No, don’t look up. I’m on the rooftop one building over. I wanted to make sure you saw this letter before I did anything final. Steven Grant Rogers, you give me hope. You make me feel as if there might be enough Bucky Barnes inside me to try living again. But then I remember that he would have done anything to protect you, whatever the cost. I will do anything to protect you, and I am the cost. This is one choice I have to make. Please, Stevie, you said you were with me ‘til the end of the line. Did you mean that? Because I need you to promise me one more thing. Promise me that you’ll take care of my body before HYDRA gets to it. I know they’re closing in, waiting for the right time to snatch up their toy again. Please don’t let them do that. Give your friend the hero’s burial he deserves. It’s been seventy goddamned years, let him rest in peace. I won’t use a gun, I won’t use a knife. There won’t be noise, there won’t be blood. Please, Stevie, let me be my own cyanide before I become yours. This is the end of the line, pal. Maybe it will feel like falling asleep. Not the cryosleep HYDRA put me in, but a real sleep… one in which I dream of you.

 

Bucky

********  
  



End file.
